A Declaration of Congressional Opposition

In 2008, Congressional Republicans lead by Mitch McConnell committed to do everything in their power to obstruct the Obama agenda, not for any reasons inherent in the policies themselves, but so that Obama could never claim bipartisanship on any legislation he might have been able to pass. It was a cynical tactic that essentially dug up Madison's grave to spit on his corpse. And it worked. The tactical opposition of Congressional Republicans wasn't able to prevent a second term for Obama, but it did contribute greatly to the historic Congressional and state level swing to Republicans and particularly conservative Republicans in 2010 and, by preventing legislation like a second stimulus package or a major infrastructure investment, ensured the economic recovery from the Bush recession would be more sluggish and less well distributed than it could have been and contributed to Trump's victory. In the history of the American 21st century, should there be anyone around to write it, Mitch McConnell will be one of our great villains, and a big part of his villainy comes from this tactic and all damage and death it lead to.

Congressional Democrats should learn from McConnell's technique, but, rather than hide behind lies about negotiation and compromise, come right out and sign their own Declaration of Congressional Opposition. Here's what that Declaration could look like.

Whereas the extent of Russian influence and interference in our presidential election, potentially in the hopes of securing a president in line with there own interests, is still to be officially determined, but thought by most intelligence agencies to extensive and intentional;

Whereas the extent of the relationship between Mr. Trump, Russia, and the Vladimir Putin regime is still unknown and that Mr. Trump himself has publicly downplayed the significance of Russian interference in our election and currently and historically praised Vladimir Putin, often comparing Putin favorably to the democratically elected and re-elected Barack Obama;

Whereas Congressional Republicans are at present unwilling to allow an independent investigation into the Russian interference in our election;

Whereas, in the absence of his full tax returns the extent of the conflicts of interest inherent in his business holdings, both foreign and domestic are unknown and;

Whereas Mr. Trump has been grossly negligent in dealing with the conflicts of interest currently known to the public by claiming to transfer executive power over his business affairs to his children who also have public roles within his transition team, rather than to a true blind trust, remaining an executive producer of The Apprentice, and maintaining ownership of his new hotel in Washington, D.C.;

We believe it cannot be known whether policies offered and/or supported by Mr. Trump and the Republican party which he now heads, are policies offered in good faith for the betterment of the United States of America and its citizens, are in service to a foreign agenda from a nation that wields power over Mr. Trump, or are for the personal enrichment of Mr. Trump, his family, and/or members of his administration;

And with the fact that Trump's opponent, Hilary Clinton, received 2.8 million more votes than he did;

We the undersigned resolve to oppose each and every policy or person offered by the Trump administration and the Republican party, including cabinet level positions and Supreme Court Justice seats, with every legislative, congressional, and parliamentary tool at our disposable, until such time that the extent of Russian influence over our election and over Mr. Trump and his administration is known and dealt with and all potential conflicts of interest are accounted for and dealt with.

One of things I've heard a lot of is this idea that Democrats in Congress will have to “pick their battles,” that they will not be able to fight everything and so must focus on the worst of Trump's potential policies. So who do we not fight? Do we give Rick Perry a pass to focus on Ben Carson? Tillerson to focus on Sessions? Or vice versa? Let the less powerful agencies slide so we can focus on the bigger departments? Which one of Trump's public nominees to date doesn't represent an existential threat to either the department which they are ostensibly supposed to lead, a dramatic departure from previous and longstanding U.S. domestic and foreign policy, and/or present legitimate risks to civilization as we know it? Who do you give a pass to?

Even the most reasonable nominee, by far, is tainted. Elaine Chao actually makes a fair amount of sense as Secretary for the Department of Transportation, however, she is Mitch McConnell's wife. McConnell was the primary force that prevented making the intelligence around Russian meddling in our election to increase the chances of a Trump victory public prior to the election and, McConnell has said he will not recuse himself from her nomination process. Chao may be qualified, but that to me, looks like textbook corruption. As much as possible, we cannot allow corruption to gain any kind of foothold in our government.

And what exactly have Republicans talked about as their policy goals that are not worth a filibuster? The repeal and delay Obamacare is policy nonsense that at absolute best will result in a whole bunch of meaningless legislative slight of hand that will allow Republicans to claim responsibility for their own version of exactly the same policies as the ACA and at worst will sow chaos in our nation's health care system and lead to many premature deaths. And they're talking about ending medicare and privatizing social security. Aren't those worth a filibuster? The very first action House Republicans took, was to hold a closed door meeting, on a holiday, to greatly weaken ethical oversight (you know, to help bring back jobs to the working class), and though massive public outcry saved the Office of Congressional Ethics, they still pushed through rules designed specifically to squelch dissent from Democrats. Where is the opportunity to compromise? For the last eight years Republicans have fought everything from major policy to relatively low-level judiciary appointments, while almost universally negotiating in bad faith. Democrats should be willing to die on every single hill Republicans wish to climb.

You might also point out that since I think McConnell's obstruction is undemocratic and a gross perversion of his responsibility as a legislator, as a citizen, and even as a human being, that it represents the worst kind of partisan politics where victory on election day is elevated above improving the lives of Americans through policy and legislation, it is hypocritical of me to ask Democrats to do the same thing I am condemning Republicans for.

In 2008, Barack Obama won 52.9% of the vote, almost 10 million more votes than John McCain, and secured 365 electoral college votes. In the Senate, Democrats gained eight seats and earned 51.9% of the vote totals. In the House, Democrats gained 21 seats and secured 53.2% of the total vote. As I've said elsewhere, I don't think there really is such a thing as a “public mandate,” but by any empirical assessment, the 2008 Democratic platform was one of the most popular political statements in our nation's history. McConnell and the Republicans that followed him, essentially spit in the eye of the American people.

In 2016, Trump lost the popular vote by 2.8 million votes and his electoral college victory hinged on about 70,000 voters in three states. Furthermore, his number of electoral college votes was far fewer than Obama's and ranks only 46th in electoral victories historically. (It's even fewer electoral college votes than Obama received in 2012 when Republicans were all but certain they had him beat.) Furthermore, Democrats gained eight seats in the House (in our heavily gerrymandered House of Representatives) and two seats in the Senate. By any empirical assessment, the American public preferred the Democratic platform over the Republican one in 2016 and it is only through an obsolete quirk in our process that Trump won. Organized Democratic opposition could actually be understood as doing the will of the American people, rather than directly opposing it.

And, unlike Barack Obama in 2008, we still do not know the full extent of Russian influence in favor of Trump in our election. Honestly, even if it the fake news stories and social media bots are the extent of it, that is enough to question the legitimacy of a Trump presidency, especially since he has downplayed the significance of Russian interference and praised Putin and it looks as though Republicans, even with pressure from well-respected Republicans like John McCain and Lindsey Graham, aren't willing to hold an independent investigation.

We also have to wonder about James Comey and the FBI. Elections are complicated animals, and their results can rarely be attributed to any one event, idea, or person, but I think it is safe to believe that Hilary Clinton is president if Comey does not break with decades of precedent and with the wishes of the other security and intelligence agencies to release the letter about Anthony Weiner's totally irrelevant computer.

Finally, over the course of the campaign and in the months that followed the election, Donald Trump has shown a shocking lack the temperament, curiosity, and attention to information, policy, and detail to be President of the United States. The question might be better framed not was "What are the best things for the Democrats to say 'no' to?" but "What could they possibly say 'yes' to?"

As we have seen with the use of budget reconciliation in the Senate to begin the dismantling of Obamacare, there are many ways the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans will be able to enforce their policies that the Democrats will be unable to stop. Furthermore, there will be techniques of Congressional opposition that Republicans were willing to use that I'm not sure are worth risking. Will there be policies so bad that Democrats are willing to shut down the government to prevent it? What happens if there is another debt ceiling fight? Are Democrats willing to let our already hobbled judiciary system continue to erode? What happens if Trump offers a potentially palatable nominee for the Supreme Court?

There will be acts of judgment Congressional Democrats will have to make, but ultimately, they can give Republicans and Trump legitimate claims to bipartisan success or they can deny them that claim. You can start from a position of unified opposition justified by legitimate concerns and the will of the majority of Americans or not. You can continue the same efforts at traditional legislative negotiation and compromise and most likely continue to get insulted by Republicans or you can try something else. You can either have your name in the public record next to some of the things a Trump administration will do or not. You can either give fascists permission or make them take it from you.

I'm not sure if a declaration like this is, ultimately the best strategy for protecting the American public, but, in moments of doubt, when there is debate, when you might not be sure what you should do, when it is hard to extrapolate all of the potential consequences of an action, “If a fascist wants this to happen, I'm going to fight like hell to stop it,” is a pretty solid fallback position.

Amending the Electoral College

The electoral college as a means of selecting the president was established for a number of reasons, none of which are particularly good. In essence, the Founders were afraid the general voting public wouldn't select men like themselves, (under the Articles of Confederation, farmers had a nasty habit of selecting other farmers to represent them) plus an electoral college style selection rather than a popular vote increased the power of southern slave holding states that had a much smaller voting population and really, really, really liked slavery and political power.

In just about every way, even after the amendment to allow direct election of the electors by the people, the electoral college is an elitist, out-of-date institution that has, now that we live in a heavily urbanized county, directly disenfranchised voters who live in cities.

For the most part, fixing the electoral college fell into the “not worth the trouble” category of problems, but, with two of the last three presidents winning their first terms while losing the popular vote, it is clear now it must be changed.

Here is a proposed amendment to the Constitution. (In your head, feel free to give the prose that Constitutional flare.)

The winner of the total national popular vote shall be considered to have received the 270 electoral college votes unless: The popular vote is essentially a tie and no candidate has a 50% plus 1 majority, at which point, the distribution of the electoral votes shall revert to existing state by state distribution procedures and/or the influence of a foreign power in the election is suspected, the winning candidate is suspected of potentially impeachable offenses, and/or the winning candidate does not take appropriate steps to eliminate conflicts of interest that would allow the winning candidate to use the office of the President for personal gain. Congress, state legislatures, and the people, will all be empowered to petition for a review in the third case, at which point, electors selected according to state rules will be empowered to secure briefings from the relevant law enforcement agencies and/or Congressional committees before meeting in their state capitals on [date]. They will also be empowered to discuss and coordinate with each other in the time preceding the meeting. At the review meeting they will be empowered to either ratify the existing results, select the candidate who was previously defeated in the general election, or call for a new Presidential election in a timely fashion that allows for the party of the removed candidate to select a new nominee with all other parties being allowed to re-run their original candidates and/or select new ones at their discretion. The current administration will continue until the results of the new election are certified reflecting the above process plus two months to allow the new incoming President to establish their transition.

Here's what I'm thinking with the above amendment. First, and most importantly, it recenters political power to one person=one vote. It doesn't matter where you live, you have the same voice in choosing your President as everyone else. If you're going to object by saying the smaller states and rural areas deserve a voice, I'll say three things: First, I believe the assumption that urban and rural, high-population and low-population, and coastal and central states having diametrically opposed interests is an assumption we need to reexamine. (And, is likely, another one of the ways Republicans kept getting the people they hurt to vote for them, but that's for a different post.) Second, small states already have the Senate (and in many ways the House). Third, MORE PEOPLE MEANS MORE PEOPLE.

Second, it's always handy to have a system that sorts out ties and, in a virtual tie and in the absence of a majority, the geographic distribution of support makes sense. It's the political equivalent of an away goal.

Third, if it looks like I'm proposing this amendment specifically to prevent another Trump from happening, you're goddamn right I am. The world has changed since the framers wrote the Constitution and the ways in which a foreign power can influence our election and how an elected president could exploit the position for personal gain have changed. Trump, conveniently, has pretty much exposed all of those changes. Honestly, “preventing another Trump” is probably the best reason I can think of for doing just about anything. And, as we have seen with the extent and intent of Russian meddling only becoming clear after the election, it would make sense to have some procedure to prevent a criminal from taking power even when they are able to dupe the people for a day. Furthermore, it is now clear that norm and convention is not enough to prevent a kleptocrat from exploiting the presidency. The removal of conflicts of interest must be enshrined in the Constitution.

One of the major problems we have faced in our both the election of Trump and the election of George W. Bush is the totally unnecessary compulsion to declare a winner on election day. Nearly all of our misconceptions about Trump's election came from declaring him the winner before all the votes were counted; before we learned how narrow his victories in the rust belt were and how dramatic Hilary Clinton's popular vote lead became. But once a narrative is set it is difficult to change and so Trump is acting like he has a mandate, 52% of Republicans believe he won the popular vote, and the pressure to ensure an orderly transition of power hamstrung any efforts the Obama administration might have made to reassess the election. When we look back to Bush's first election, there really wasn't any good reason to stop counting in Florida. If we establish a simple procedure in the case of a delay of the results, then there isn't a problem if it takes longer than usual to determine the winner.

Obviously, given that I'm not a statistician or a constitutional scholar, there are some gaps in my proposal. What would be a statistical tie? Less than 1% difference seems too high, given the numbers we're talking, so less than .5% perhaps. I don't know. Second, in terms of petitioning for review, it can't be so easy that the losing party always request it, but it also can't require a majority or super-majority as then as long as the president-elect is a member of the majority party, odds are said party will never allow a petition of review no matter how criminal the president-elect may be. The same balance must be struck with the ability for states and the people to request a review. The bar must be set high enough so the review doesn't become a way for the losing group to gum up the transition, nor must it be so high that the party in power is able to always prevent it.

There are two ways to amend the Constitution and we can call for both of them. The first an amendment can be passed by a super-majority of both chambers of Congress so, you can call your Congressional representatives and the second is through a Constitutional convention as called by the states. Historically, Congress has acted before such a convention could be called to pass the requested amendment because once that convention is called anything can happen.


It's hard to imagine contemporary Republicans supporting this at either the national or the state level because the odds that they can win a national popular vote as they are composed now is just about zero, but you can do something or you can do nothing. Calling for this amendment will, if it gains any traction, at the very least, force Republicans to spout their bullshit about small states. And now, while the wound is still raw, is the time to start pushing. Maybe the above suggestion isn't the right way to fix the problem, but I hope, it get the conversation started.

Reading to Cope and Reading to Resist

Reading to Cope
I barely slept the night of November 8th into the morning of November 9th. When I eventually got out of bed, I was exhausted, my eyes and throat hurt, and an orb of ill-feeling settled into a my stomach. I, as so many of you, spent the next few days in a stress induced haze. I put my old friend Ulysses in my satchel to carry around with me even though I only nibbled at it here and there.

Some of the great books I was reading at the time, The Lesser Bohemians and Float for example, fell by the wayside, not because something about them drove me away, but because I found myself spending more time on social media on my breaks at work and my leisure time in general; fighting on Facebook, tweeting, retweeting, reading the latest horror stories in the Post, Globe, and Times, calling congressional representatives, and signing petitions. Even though those books were there for my brain, at the time, my brain wasn't there for them.

I retreated to lighter stuff, the easier stuff, books written primarily to entertain and enchant, books that didn't want to be examined, critiqued, analyzed, just enjoyed for what they are, but I didn't want to retreat completely. Self-care is important, recharging your batteries is important, getting your brain back together is important so you can use it to the best of your abilities, but there are ways to cope and resist at the same time. So I bought books by Saladin Ahmed and Chuck Wendig because I appreciate their voices on social media, how they both take stands for what the believe in, have unique voices, and remind us, in their own ways, of important things we sometimes forget. And they had books that fit what I felt I needed.

Ahmed's Throne of the Crescent Moon is an entertaining sword and sorcery story that seems to be setting the table for a very interesting exploration of political power in a fascinating world of ghuls and spells. It's hard to predict where The Crescent Moon Kingdoms series goes from here, but Ahmed has set the table to engage with everything from the tension between order and oppression, the conflict between cosmopolitan and rural societies, and the way power changes our ideals, or to just keep throwing plucky heroes and scary monsters at us. Or both.

In middle school I read a bunch of books from the Star Wars universe (as I'm writing this I vividly remember a scene where Luke Skywalker uses The Force to cloud the minds of a fleet of Tie Fighter pilots and can actually feel the presence of the Dark Side within him), so of course I had to get Wendig's Aftermath. Set soon after the destruction of the second Death Star, the bulk of the book thus far (haven't finished it yet) seems to be organizing the world, introducing us to new characters and reintroducing us to old, and, in general, setting things up for the stories that get us to The Force Awakens.

For better or worse, humans are adaptable and my brain began to adapt to the persistent current of stress and disbelief that is and will be Trump's America. That orb of ill-feeling remained, but I was able to put food in my stomach around it. Though I was finally building back up to the reading pile I normally maintain (here's an example of what that looks like), I still wanted something familiar to tag along for a little while, like planting a friend at the bar while you're on a blind date.

So I picked up The Long Ships by Frans G. Bengtsson. It as hard to describe how much I fucking love this book as it is to figure why I love this book so fucking much. I recommend it all the time and pretty much everyone I recommend it to eventually tells me how fucking awesome it is. I once lent my copy to my Dad, because I knew he'd love it. A few months later I asked him if I could have it back. He looked me square in the eye and said “No.” So, I just bought another copy.

Along with a couple of those comforting reads, I'm now back up to the reading pile I usually maintain. And, along with everything else, I've been thinking about what my life is going to look like for the next few years and how I'm going to meet my artistic, political, social, emotional responsibilities. What will the resistance look like in Trump's America? There are smarter people who have spent more time studying the nature of resistance who will have more concrete, more useful, more direct actions, techniques, and strategies, but, in terms of how we read, this is what I've come up with so far.

Reading to Resist
I think it's telling that, in the early aftermath of the election, the first thing so many of us on the losing side did was seek out books to help us understand the people who we had apparently ignored, misunderstood, or even insulted. We rushed to books, Hillbilly Elegy, Strangers in Their Own Land, and the Great Unraveling for example. Smart people put together reading lists to guide us. And there will be more, as publishers (like our good friend Melville House) crash books about the coming resistance into publication. Over the course of a night, it suddenly looked like we didn't understand our own country and many of us immediately sought out books to help us understand.

Books, in general, offer a particular perspective on the human experience; a long view of history, sense of interconnectedness, empathy, nuance, comfort with a level of ambiguity. They draw lines from past actions to contemporary consequences. They add depth and knowledge. There is the belief, maybe even faith, that if we just read enough about something, we'll be able to get handle on it and solve its problems or improve its conditions. On November 9th, we saw a problem and we immediately sought to educate ourselves so we could understand and solve it. But as the vote totals have been finalized, as we learn more about why people voted for Trump, and as the effect of fake news and Russian hacking begins to reveal itself, the more irrelevant the type of thinking reading engenders and supports seems to be.

Despite strong third party showings, voter suppression in Republican states, and all of the other assaults on her policy and character, Clinton won the popular vote by almost 3 million votes. By any rational way of understanding the results, Clinton won the argument. And it's not hard to see why she won the argument. Along with Trump's many disqualifying flaws, Clinton presented a cogent, coherent, and comprehensive set of policies that would have used the base established under the Obama administration to greatly improve the lives of the vast majority of Americans while grappling with climate change (you know, civilization's most urgent threat). As we have floundered around to explain what happened, especially in the early days after the election, the Clinton campaign was accused of a lot of things, most specifically neglecting the white working class (whoever they are), but if you look back, she did nearly everything pundits accused her of not doing; talking about jobs, offering solutions to the lack of American manufacturing, having a plan to transition coal mining communities to a new economy, closing the education gap, reducing the cost burden of childcare, etc. In short, the lives of the white working class (whoever they are) would have greatly improved (perhaps as much as any time since the post war boom) if Clinton's policies were enacted. The only thing she didn't give them was the opportunity to whine about people of color. The only reason she's not President is a few narrow defeats in key states.

The value of bookish thinking continues to diminish the more we learn about Trump voters. Not only are we talking about overt white supremacists, but we now know, thanks to a whole range of forces, that many of his voters live in an entirely different world of accepted fact than I do. Furthermore, we now know that there was a percentage of Trump voters who simply refused to believe that he would do the things he promised to do that would HURT THEM. This isn't the usual cognitive dissidence, this is a powerful selective reasoning, a kind of racist optimism that lets people assume Trump would do all those horrible things to people of color but none of the things he promised to white people. They reasoned that, even as he promised to repeal Obamacare and even though House Republicans have voted about 50 times to repeal Obamacare, it helps too many of them to be dismantled. To me, that is a decision making system that has already rejected the system that reading supports. To put this another way; Clinton's failure to convince some voters had nothing to do with argument.

The root of the rejection is deep and complicated, going back thousands of years of religious dogma and tribalism right up through McCarthyism, the Southern Strategy, and the myth of liberal bias in media. In other post or essay or ramble, I might spend a few thousand works exploring the differences between “dogmatic” and “ideological” thinking and how those differences play out in contemporary politics, but I'm thinking about the books we can read right now.

Maybe after a little more time to think and read I'll come up with a better answer, but, right now, it seems the best way to read to resist is to support writers who resist. If you support the stance Celeste Ng takes on social media, her opinions, her #smallacts, you should buy and read her book. If you've already got a copy, you should buy another one and give it to a friend or donate it to a little free library. If you can't afford to buy a copy, you can make sure it's in circulation at your local library. Then, whenever you favorite or retweet a tweet of hers (whether something political or a story about her charming and curious kid) just remember at some point that day, to share a link to her book on your social media (here's a good one to share) and urge your friends and followers to buy it. Part of the challenge of resistance is securing the resources to resist, finding ways to risk losing your job, risk being arrested, risk having your stuff vandalized, risk being physically hurt, and, in our capitalist economy, money is a resource that mitigates all risks.

I have no idea what the resistance is going to look like. I'm not sure even those who understand resistance much more than I do know what it's going to look like. But right now, we can support the fighters and we should. This is how you feed the resistance. And it's really a win-win, because you also end up with another book.




(PS. It occurs to me this post could be read as very self-serving in that I've written a book, I think it's swell when people buy it, and I consider myself resisting. Though I suppose you don't have a compelling reason to believe me, I will tell you that is not what intended for this post and I only realized that interpretation was possible after I'd edited it a few times. But, reading is powerful because of the freedom of interpretation, so I can't stop you from reading this as a writer surreptitiously begging people to buy his book. I can only ask that you don't punish the other authors who I've mentioned in this post. If you were thinking of supporting them before it occurred to you that I might be being selfish with this post, please continue to support them.)

About 70,000 White Supremacists

With the difference between Trump and Clinton in the three key states in this election down to around 70,000 votes (and still shrinking, though this could change again with recounts), I think we need to grapple with the fact that our initial knee-jerk explanations for Clinton's electoral loss were all wrong. As that number shrinks, and as Clinton's popular vote lead continues to grow (at 2.7 million as of this writing), it becomes clear that so much of the hand-wringing over identity politics and Democrat outreach to the white working class (whoever that is), might be dangerously misguided. There might be a simpler, but, in some ways, more distressing reason for Clinton's electoral college loss.

I'm drawing my conclusion from two primary facts: Trump outperformed Mitt Romney with white voters and all the polling indicated the Clinton would win. Combined with the enthusiasm of the KKK for the Trump campaign, the role of Steve Bannon in his campaign, and the spike in hate crimes after election, these facts points to one potential conclusion: About 70,000 white supremacists in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania who had not voted in recent elections and/or came from demographics that do not regularly vote (and thus were unlikely to be polled) turned out for Trump.

That's it. In our electoral college system, 70,000 votes (or even less) in the right states will overpower millions of votes elsewhere. It had nothing to do with Clinton's messaging on economic issues, and probably nothing to do with how much time she spent in various states, and probably nothing to do with the Democrats focus on voter registration rather than turning out registered Democrats. It was simply that a population that had previously dropped out of the political process and who happened to live in the right places turned out to vote. A population that is, in many ways, beyond influence.

This is not to say that Clinton ran a perfect campaign or that Comey had no influence on the election, or that the media's creation of a false equivalency didn't have an impact, but, that the population all of those things had the greatest impact on was not the white working class (whoever they are) or third party voters, or Democrats who might not have been energized by Clinton who didn't vote, but on a population that I haven't seen much discussion of yet: moderate Republicans.

Trump did win the Republican primary, but along the way, more Republicans voted against him than for him. (He has yet to win the majority of votes in any of the contests he's run in.) In a crowded and weak field, Trump was able to win because he had a simple message that spoke to the base, he was already famous, he got tons of free publicity from the media, and, he energized a population that probably wasn't doing a lot of primary voting before. In short, in the relatively low turnout primaries, against the likes of Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, and, likely with the help of an awakening white supremacist movement, Trump still was not able to convince the majority of Republicans to vote for him.

And yet, when November came around, despite many prominent Republican leaders opposing him throughout the entire primary process, despite most Republicans voting against him in the primaries, and despite a series of actions and scandals that would have ended the campaigns of any other candidate at any other time, moderate Republicans decided the little R next to his name was more important than anything else. I suspect that the thirty-year smear campaign against Hilary Clinton and the false equivalency perpetuated by the media, and the balance of coverage about Clinton focusing on her email non-issues rather than on her policy ideas and qualifications, had their biggest effect not on third party voters, not on Democrats who stayed home from the polls, and not on voters who switched from Obama to Trump, though they were all impacted as well, but on moderate Republicans who did not switch their votes enough to counteract the surge in new white supremacist voters. Perhaps I've missed it in my media stream, but it seems like all of the Republican hold-your-nose Trump voters have gotten a pass. There are Republicans who should have known better and who bear as much responsibility for Trump's election as those who didn't vote at all.

For Democrats, this interpretation poses a huge problem. You can change a message, you can change outreach focus, you can change voter turnout goals, you can change which voters you are most trying to turn out, but you can't and shouldn't really try to court the votes of white supremacists. At best, you should simply have a political system in which white supremacist beliefs are unacceptable and they drop out of the process as had likely been the case, and at worst you always have enough non-white supremacists voting in all parties and in all elections to overcome any white supremacist voting block. But with the electoral college system, 70,000 unexpected votes or less, in the right places, can overcome millions of votes everywhere else.

The real goal then, for Democrats, or really, for everyone who doesn't want a system that can be swayed by well-placed fringe populations is election reform and despite that being the obvious solution to a Trump election (at least as the data stands now) it's not very politically attractive. And it calls for either a constitutional amendment or for a significant number of states to change how they allocate their electoral college votes (though, that's not actually binding.) and, given that Republicans can only win the Presidency for the foreseeable future if millions of voters in California can be nullified by thousands of voters in the Midwest, it is highly unlikely this will happen. Or, to put this another way, Republicans only stay in power because our electoral systems (sometimes in good ways but mostly in bad ways) dis-empower voters in urban centers.

The problem, of course, came because, in our rush to declare a winner, to have a headline, to fill in the map, we drew conclusions before all of the information was in. If the results were kept secret until all the votes were counted, the narrative of this election would have been a lot different. Instead of Clinton abandoning the white working class (whoever they are) or the “economic anxiety” of the rust belt (despite most people in exit polls believing Clinton superior on the economy), or the failure of “identity politics,” we would have always been talking about what this election actually is: a fluke of our outdated system. One that could be easily corrected—given Trump's obviously lack of qualifications for the job—with another feature of our outdated system. The real danger here, is that, too often, the first narrative sticks whether it is true or not (especially when it is advantageous for someone) and Democrats seem willing to act and react as though they were soundly defeated in this election.

In the near future, this tells me one thing about how Democrats should interact with the Trump administration. Given that Clinton won the popular vote, given that the electoral college results hinged on such a slim plurality, and given how Trump has conducted himself, before and after the election, Democrats should give him, his administration, and his policies as much respect as Republicans gave to President Obama. None. Fight every single one of his appointees from the cabinet on down. Use every procedural trick to delay, block, degrade, and prevent every policy the Republicans offer, even the ones that seem reasonable. Filibuster everything. Abuse it the way Republicans abused it. I mean, they hobbled the Supreme Court on purpose. There may not be a good lesson on how to win future elections to come out of this, but it is clear the Democrats need to fight as if they are saving America from a kleptocrat who sneaked into power on an obsolete technicality, because that is what happened.

Why the Electors Should Elect Hillary Clinton

The electoral college is a strange institution. It is a nod to populism and democracy restrained by a heavy dose of elitism. It was created, in part, because the Founders were not sure the people were capable of electing a President, and, also, because this is America, another way for slave-holding states to protect their institution. It should be abolished. However, for most of its history, the electoral college vote and the popular vote lined up anyway and so it fell to the “if it ain't broke,” priority level. But now, two of the last three Presidents have been elected to their first term after losing the electoral vote. And given how the demographics in this country are changing, I suspect the odds of the popular President losing will continue to increase. The best solution is, of course, a Constitutional amendment abolishing the electoral college and instituting a simple popular vote (or perhaps even a hybrid system where the College is used to break a statistical tie), but the second best solution is for electors to informally commit to cast their votes for whichever candidate won the popular vote. And there is no pair of candidates more deserving of informal solution than Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Here's why. (And the way things are going, this list will be incomplete the day or so after I publish it.)

Clinton Won the Popular Vote By a Substantial Margin

As of this writing, experts are estimating that Clinton is likely to have received 2 million more votes than Donald Trump. There is a chance that margin of victory could be much higher. This is not within a margin of error. That is not a small enough number to claim they are essentially tied and use the geographic distribution of electoral college votes as the tie breaker. That is a clear win.

Honestly, even with everything else I am going to argue specifically about Trump, if this were not the case, if he had won the popular vote or if that difference had been less than or around the difference between Bush and Gore in 2000, none of that would matter. Living in a representative democracy means accepting the representatives that are elected. If a majority of Americans voted for him, there would be no justifiable reason for electors to even consider breaking with precedent. But most Americans voted for Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump is an unprecedented candidate.

Trump's Ties to Russia

It is somewhat ironic, that buried within all the terrible justifications for the electoral college is a decent one that is suddenly relevant. The primary reason for the “natural-born citizen” clause in the Constitution is to protect the United States from a President who is under the influence of a foreign power. In short, the electors are bound by the Constitution to protect the country from a President with compromising foreign ties. Suspicion of compromising ties to Russia and the Putin regime have plagued the Trump campaign, along with evidence of Russian meddling in our election in his favor. A Russian diplomat claimed that Russia had long been in contact with the Trump campaign. Trump also, HAS ALREADY TALKED TO VLADIMIR PUTIN. BEFORE HE TALKED TO THE PENTAGON. We still only have strong suspicions, but we have at least as much of it for Trump's alleged ties to Russia as we did for Clinton's alleged misconduct as Secretary of State.

That there is a reasonable suspicion and that he TALKED TO PUTIN BEFORE THE PENTAGON and we have an alternative that won the popular vote makes this decision much less fraught.

Unprecedented Conflicts of Interest

Rather than putting his business affairs in a true blind trust, he has simply turned over their management to three of his children, which does not constitute the blind trust that would undo the risk of conflicts of interest. To make matters worse, those same three children will be on his transition team. This is a clear conflict of interest and one that cannot be tolerated. He has now also asked that his son-in-law be given security clearance, a person with no apparent role in the administration who also happens to own media. And already Ivanka has come under fire for potentially using the platform of the presidency to hawk her jewelry line. Perhaps what is most alarming about the overtness of these violations of protocol is that it is clear either no one in the Trump family or transition team actually understands what the concept of conflict of interest is or doesn't care. This, at the very least, suggests that Trump is, at the very least, comfortable with, at the very least, appearing like he is using the Presidency for personal enrichment. Or, to put this another, Republicans would lose their goddamn minds if Hillary Clinton included Chelsea in her transition team.

Furthermore, because he did not release his full tax returns, we do not know what other potential conflicts of interest he might have. Does he have relationships with foreign banks? Does he have investments in industries that stand to gain from certain policies? Does he hold compromising debts? Has he evaded taxes in potentially actionable ways? In short, we already see one very direct, very avoidable, disqualifying conflict of interest and have reason to suspect there may be many more.

Steve Bannon

According to Steve Bannon's own words and other white supremacists, Steve Bannon is a white supremacist. The fact that Trump has named him chief strategist and given him such a level of power in shaping the executive branch of the United States of America, tells me that Donald Trump is unfit to be the President of the United States, if for no other reason that it is an extremely stupid, stupid thing to do. If Trump wanted a smooth transition, even for nefarious purposes, if Trump wanted to quiet some of the protest surrounding his election, even for nefarious purposes, if Trump wanted to make it difficult for Democrats to oppose the Republican agenda, even for nefarious purposes, giving Bannon a high profile position is a terrible tactic as it validates all of the accusations leveled against him. Along with all the reasons why such a terrible person should not have that much power in our society, it displays a shocking lack of judgment by Donald Trump. (Sidenote: Bannon is only third because in terms of the roll of the electoral college, the first two points, I think, are directly relevant to their Constitutional responsibilities.)

He Has Empowered White Supremacy

Emboldened by Trump's election, there has been a spike in hate crimes around the country. As of this writing, no one has died. There are moments when I am grateful and there are moments when I am terrified that I am grateful that no one has died. Significant aspects of his platform are overtly unconstitutional and, along with damaging the lives of American citizens and other human beings, will clog our court systems with constant legal battles. And he was endorsed by the KKK and is bringing known racists (see above) into the White House. We don't want a President endorsed by the KKK and we don't need to have one.

Ongoing Legal Issues

Trump also faces an ongoing lawsuit against Trump University, one that could potentially result in criminal charges. He has also been accused by multiple women of sexual assault. He and his businesses have also had a long history of refusing to pay contractors and others who have performed services for them and daring them to take him to court. Perhaps his election will discourage those who might have brought suit against him. Perhaps that is an even better reason not to make him president.

His Transition Has Been a Disaster

His transition team has had one major shake-up, he is not prepared to higher the requisite staff, he needs extra coaching from Obama to be prepared, his proposed cabinet (all the versions of his proposed cabinet) are just the people who were nicest to him over the course of his campaign, in absence of other preparation he's hired the same lobbyists, cronies, and corporate stooges he promised to “drain” from Washington, and his communication with the various parts of the executive branch have been spotty at best.

He has had months to prepare. He has had since July, to do the work of creating an administration. Given that he does not have any previous government experience, I think we can forgive something of a learning curve. That said, he is now going to be the most powerful person on the planet. If he does a poor job of preparing to govern, when he has only one (albeit complicated) issue to prepare for, how good of a job actually governing can we expect him to do?

He Doesn't Want to Be President

As has been abundantly clear by his desire to only spend part of his time at the White House and the look on his face during his meetings with President Obama, Trump had no idea the scale of the responsibility of the presidency and has no particular desire to rise to the scale. He wants to give speeches. He wants to have the triumph of winning the election. He wants his ego validated. He does not want to govern. He can have everything that he wants and Clinton can still be President.

Arguments Against

There are, of course, reasons one might decide honoring one particular aspect of the electoral college is more important than preventing the certain damage a Trump presidency will do to the world. As with all arguments, some are more valid than others. Here are a few that I anticipate along with my counter arguments.

Small States

Just look at all that red on the map. The electoral college ensures that smaller, less populated states don't have their views trammeled by the urban majority. We should respect that right.

Small states already have the Senate. They essentially have the House too. In fact, in every governing body where representation is distributed geographically, smaller communities have more power than larger communities. There should be safe guards that ensure the interests of those who don't live in major metropolitan areas are respected, but those safe guards already exist. (I mean, one of the major reasons Massachusetts doesn't fund the MBTA at the level it needs is the geographic distribution of legislative power enhances the influence of Western Massachusetts who somehow doesn't get that I don't really drive on their roads that my taxes pay for in the same way they don't really ride the T.)

And about that red map. It certainly looks impressive, but, there are fewer people in the red than there are in the blue. I've had discussions around this issue before, and there really isn't a way to get around the fact that arguing for the electoral college argues that people in cities deserve less representation than people in towns. Even if you don't intend for that to be the case, when representation is allocated geographically, that is the case. There are a lot of different ways to handle this (parliamentary-style proportional representation rather than winner-take-all elections has some appeal) but in the short term, respecting the interests of the greater number of voting American citizens requires electors voting for Clinton.

Won't There Be Unrest

Before they won the electoral college, Trump and his surrogates were crowing about how the election would be “rigged” and how they would not respect the results if Clinton won. Some, including people who have held office, advocated for protest and (I'm being very generous here) hinted at armed resurrection. If they were posturing that way before the election, even though if you accept the electoral college as valid you have to accept elector freedom as valid, imagine the kind of violence they would be capable of if pledged electors flipped their votes.

First, there already is unrest. Unless, of course, you don't consider a wave of hate crimes unrest.

Second, I thought we weren't supposed to negotiate with terrorists. If Trump and his supporters are willing to resort to violence to install him in the Presidency that is all the more reason he shouldn't have it.

What if a Republican Wins the Popular Vote But Not the Electoral College

Then that candidate should be President. As I said earlier, this movement to influence electors doesn't really happen if Trump won the popular vote.

We Should Respect the State by State Results

Whether or not this is a legitimate way of electing the President (see above about the representation of small states in government), Republican governments in numerous states, including important swing states like Florida, North Carolina, Arizona, and Wisconsin actively suppressed the vote in specific populations in order to increase their chances of winning. Voter fraud is, essentially, non-existent, and yet, waving this boogey-man around after the gutting of the Voting Rights Act by the Supreme Court, Republican state governments imposed onerous registration requirements and reduced access to the ballot in ways that specifically targeted African-American and other likely Democratic voters. Therefore, there is good reason to question the validity of the results in all states that imposed voting restrictions after the Voting Rights Act was voided.

It Wasn't a Popular Vote Election/Any Other Technical Reason to Question the Popular Vote

I have seen some fairly logical, fairly reasonable arguments why the fact of the popular vote win in this case does not really mean that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. I'm as big a fan of logical and reasonableness as the next guy and logic and reason tell me that we need to do everything we can to prevent a Trump Presidency. I think the numbers also would have been different if say, it mattered at all that he lied more than the told the truth, or if a false equivalency hadn't been created between the two of the major candidates, or if he hadn't been giving millions or even billions of dollars in free publicity by CNN et al., or if Republicans hadn't been smearing Clinton for thirty years for having the audacity to try to be a woman in power, or if moderate Republican voters actually voted the moderate choice, or any of the other myriad of woulda, coulda, shouldas between us and the Trump presidency.

Go ahead, call me a sore loser. But I would have some serious questions about someone who could lose graciously to the KKK.

An Open Letter to Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey

Now the work begins. I am still figuring out what I am going to do, where I am going to send my money how I am going to help. I think it's clear the primary policy goal is to flip the House (and maybe the Senate, though that might be even more of a long shot) in 2018, the way Republicans flipped it in 2010. I think between then and now, we need to find ways to prevent and ameliorate the damage a Republican administration (let alone a Trump administration) will do to this country, especially this country's most powerless and vulnerable citizens. I'm a writer so my first impulse is to write stuff. Below is a letter I sent to both of my Senators. I should note that, though I don't remember where I saw this first, I definitely saw this idea expressed by other people. If you like what I have to say and/or the way I say it, you are free to use this words in part or in total. Boats against the current, y'all and don't let the bastards grind you down.

Dear Senator Elizabeth Warren & Senator Ed Markey,

In 2008, Barack Obama won the popular vote and the electoral college. The Democrats won the House and won a super-majority in the Senate. I don't know if popular mandates really exist, but 2008 was awfully close to one. And how did congressional Republicans respond to the direct endorsement of the 2008 Democratic platform: by vowing to make President Obama a one-term president.

To do so they abused every procedural loophole, broke decades old agreements, and ignored long-standing decorum. They obstructed bipartisan legislation with anonymous holds. They refused to confirm Federal appointments. They filibustered virtually every single piece of legislation that was put forth.

Furthermore, there is ample evidence that they never once negotiated in good faith. They never intended to support anything President Obama proposed even when it was essentially a Republican policy. Even when their ideas were incorporated into legislation through compromise and consensus, as the federally administered public option was removed from the Affordable Care Act, they still refused to support the legislation. They asked for everything and even when they got it, they still said “no.” Their only goal was to deny the first African-American President anything resembling a policy victory and if that meant hobbling the efforts to recover after the worst recession since The Great Depression and stoking the fires of racist resentment, so be it.

I am not asking you to shout at President Trump during his State of the Union address. Even though more Americans voted for Hillary Clinton I am not asking you to question the legal validity of his presidency. I am not asking you to question his citizenship, to spread rumors about his faith, to accuse him of crimes he did not and could not have committed, or to attribute problems to him he could in no way have prevented. I'm not asking you to stoop to their level of insulting the American people by refusing to outwardly respect their President.

But I am asking you to block everything. Filibuster everything. Put an anonymous hold on everything. You were rewarded for your decency and your commitment to longstanding procedures with the Tea Party, a vacant Supreme Court seat, government shutdowns, a game of chicken with the debt ceiling, and Donald Trump, a man who began his political career by questioning Barak Obama's citizenship. Given how the districts were gerrymandered in 2010, given how they treated you when you were in power, given that more Americans voted for Democrats in the House in 2014, and given that Hillary Clinton received more votes for President than Donald Trump, they have not earned your consent or cooperation. They have not earned the right to discriminate. They have not earned the right to discard science. They have not earned the right to threaten a woman's right to choose. They have not earned the right to risk the health and well-being of our people. They have not earned the right to govern as if they speak for all Americans. They have not earned the respect they refused to show to you.

If the Trump administration magically starts proposing productive thoughtful policies with meaningful common ground, then negotiate for the best version of those policies possible, but make no compromises for the sake of compromise. Do not reach across the aisle to create the optics of bipartisanship. You've tried that already and they spit in your hand.

To be the adult in this room, you need to fight like hell.

We know exactly what they plan to do and we know the terrible consequences if their platform is adopted. I know you will not be able to stop everything, but you are our dam against the flood of dangerous policies and we need you to hold strong for at least two years.

I promise, that if you do, the voters of America will do better in 2018.

Thank you for your time.

Signed,

Josh Cook

A Nader & Sanders Voter for Clinton

I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000 and (after a funny scream disqualified the progressive Democrat running in the primary) 2004. I also voted for Bernie Sanders in the primary. As a left-wing, independent progressive, I believe Hilary Clinton is the best choice for President.

First, though I am talking primarily to voters who are planning to vote for Jill Stein (and maybe even a few planning to vote for Gary Johnson) or cast some other protest vote, I want to make clear that this isn't going to be one of those condescending “Woe betide those who repeat my mistake,” posts I've seen pop up lately as the potential impact of third-party candidates on the upcoming election is examined. I believe the assertion that Nader made Bush president is, at best, an over-emphasis  one factor out of many that lead to the Bush presidency and at worst, a calculated attempt by Democrat leadership to stifle progressive dissent in American politics and dodge blame for a disastrous campaign. But, that is the past and we are looking towards the future. (If you want me to explain that belief, leave a comment.) 2016 is a very different election from 2000 and so my decision is different. Though I am proud of my votes for Nader, this November, I am voting for Hilary Clinton. Here's why.


Jill Stein is Not Your Savior
In a lot of ways, Ralph Nader was ultimately not a great candidate, but Jill Stein has her problems too. Yes, I agree with her on many issues (more on policy agreements later) and yes I do think the two party-system is inherently destructive, but Stein has pandered to the anti-vaccination movement and is suspicious that WiFi might cause cancer. What seems to be at play here, more than anything, is Stein's attempt to woo voters who have become suspicious of government regulations through protesting corporate influence, but, to me, that is no different than Republicans and conservatives “asking questions” about human-driven climate change. The science is as certain as science can be on these issues and it is dangerous to suggest otherwise.

Secondly, a few months ago Stein herself tweeted out this graphic from one of those quizzes that shows you how much you agree with the various candidates. Obviously, Sanders was closest, but, according to her own graphic, she agrees with Clinton 91% of the time. If you're thinking of voting for Jill Stein, you really need to ask yourself about the value of that 9%. Maybe some of that 9% (like the anti-vaccination stuff) is stuff you actually agree with Clinton on. Maybe some of that 9% is meaningful difference on issues that aren't particularly important. And maybe, some of that 9% is simply Clinton putting forward what she thinks is a possible policy version of a progressive idea.

Regardless, if you are thinking of voting for Stein in this election, you have to ask yourself whether that 9% really is definitive, because there is a good chance you've fallen into the cult of personality that Republicans and Conservatives have spent the last 25 years constructing around Clinton.

Clinton is Not the Devil
I don't know if there is anyone in the history of American politics who has been subject to more scrutiny than Hilary Clinton. And what has this endless procession of investigations turned up? A person using as much power as is legally allowed to do what she thinks is right and, worse yet, a woman doing the exact same things a man in her position would. That's it. Nothing from the House. Nothing from the FBI. Nothing from the IRS. Nothing going back to Arkansas. Nothing when she was in the Senate. Nothing when she was Secretary of State. The most anyone has ever seems to find is incidents, situations, and set ups that “raise questions.” Those in power will always, always, always have opportunities to abuse it for personal gain and those who, with the best of intentions, seek to create change through that power will always, always, always, approach the line of legality, and those who get caught at that line will always, always, always, try to get prove they didn't do anything wrong. That is what political power is. Ask yourself this, if any of these many, many investigations had ever found any truly meaningful wrongdoing, would Republicans let you forget about it for even a second? Perhaps the loudest proclamation of innocence came when the final House investigation on Benghazi did not release a summary of their findings. Don't you think if they or the FBI or really anybody ever founding anything meaningful, they would be crowing about it 24/7?

The other source of distrust I've heard and held about Clinton is the idea that she will “say whatever it takes to get elected,” and that her positions are constantly changing. In terms of the first objection, trying to get elected is what politicians do. Though one could identify degrees along a spectrum, Nader said what he said to get elected, Dean said what he said to get elected, Obama said what he said to get elected, and Sanders said what he said to get elected. Jill Stein is doing it right now, having the gall to argue that Congressional Republicans would restrain a Trump presidency. You could argue that Clinton is more overtly calculated than the others, that her statements have a precision that feels dishonest, and that she always seems to speak with an eye towards plausible-deniability, and though that all could be true, I don't see how, given that 91% agreement above, that disqualifies her from the presidency. (I mean, Bill Clinton, as sitting president, used a technical definition of “sexual relations” and then deconstructed the word “to be” on national television and yet, he isn't considered fundamentally dishonest. And then there's Trump who has done almost nothing but lie his entire campaign.) Yes, she talks as if every word she says is under a malicious microscope, but that's because every word she says is under a malicious microscope. If you think that makes her corrupt and dishonest, then, as above, you have fallen into a cult of personality constructed by Republicans and conservatives. Do you really want to hang out with that crowd?

Next, though it is true that Clinton's policies and beliefs have “evolved” over the course of her political life it is important to note how they have evolved. For the most part, as the country and the Democratic party have gotten more progressive since Bill Clinton moved it to the right during his “triangulation” phase, Clinton has followed suit. Yes, her policies have changed over the decades, but they have almost always changed to agree more with you. Yes, the policies Clinton espouses now and those on the Democratic platform are more progressive than when they started due, almost entirely, to the pressure created by the Sanders's campaign, but shouldn't we count that a victory? Why, exactly, would Clinton or any Democrat listen to progressives if she gets no support even after incorporating some progressive ideas into her platform?

Ultimately, if a bill to raise the minimum wage landed on Clinton's desk, she would sign it. The same goes for steps towards universal health care, paid parental leave, solutions for climate change, affordable higher education, and regulations for Wall Street. Is the fact that Hilary Clinton once opposed gay marriage really so damning, so unforgivable, so untrustworthy, that you will vote to prevent nearly every policy that you would like to see adopted? Does the fact that she voted for the Iraq War when the Bush administration was lying to us about weapons of mass destruction especially disqualify her from holding office? Does that one vote completely invalidate all of the potential good that could come from her presidency? (And seriously, if hawkishness is an issue for you, why the fuck aren't you talking about the Obama administration's drone war?) If the answer is “yes,” than you are acting exactly like someone who plans to vote for Trump while not actually believing what he says about walls and Muslims.

Finally, it is important to elect a woman to the presidency, just like it was important to elect an African-American man. Waiting for the perfect “first woman president,” will mean never getting a first woman president. Besides, being less than perfect hasn't stopped us from electing white men, so I don't know why it should stop us from electing Hilary Clinton.

Trump, However, is Probably The Devil
For as bad as George W Bush was, at least he did not fundamentally threaten our political process. Trump does. He does not care about the truth or politics or democracy or policy or really anything besides his own ego. He will absolutely abuse his powers as president and I don't think there is any evidence that the Republican party, should they retain control of the House, has a fraction of the basic political courage and moral decency to impeach him when he does. (If they did, they would not be supporting him now.) He will do nothing about climate change, nothing about poverty, nothing about equality, and he will undo what little we've accomplished over the last eight years. He will sow discord in our military leadership, he will demolish decades old alliances, his impulses will threaten the world economy, he will empower tyrants, and he will empower white supremacists. People of color will die from a Trump presidency. They will be killed by police, by the National Guard, and by their neighbors. Even now, while the election is still going on, he is sowing chaos and I am truly afraid that there will be violence if he loses as well. This isn't about lesser-of-two-evilism; this is about survival.

There are serious questions about Jill Stein's ability to be President, Donald Trump is a life-threatening phenomenon, and Hilary Clinton, perhaps history's most scrutinized politician, is probably going to do a bunch of what you want anyway. What else do you need?

But How Do I Work for a More Just Political System?
It is clear that the two-party system isn't good for democracy, but it is also clear that, at least in this election, presidential politics is not the place to fight against it. So, if that is politically important to you, you should vote for Hilary Clinton in this election and run as a third-party candidate for local office at the next opportunity. As Republicans and conservatives have known and exploited for decades, local politics provides opportunities for change not available at the national level. Run for city council. Run for school board. Run for sheriff. Run for district attorney. By changing the political landscape in your city, country, or district, you can be begin changing the political landscape of the country.

Second, support progressive candidates in Democrat primaries, but still vote Democrat in the general. As I mentioned above, the Sanders campaign had a huge impact on the state of Democratic party, but that impact is only meaningful if Clinton wins the presidency. Once again, why should Democrats pay attention to independent progressives if there's nothing to show for it when they do? If we show Democrats they can with with progressive ideas they will support progressive ideas.

Third, work to reform election law. The landscape of American politics looks a lot of different with instant-run-off voting and though this really should be a national issue, most election law is handled at the state level. So work to put a referendum or something on your state's next election ballot.

Concluding on a Tactical Level
Finally, on a tactical level, I don't think we should underestimate the impact of progressives voting straight-ticket Democratic in 2016, 2018, and 2020 in national and state level elections. Meaningful victories in the next three elections for Democrats could turn the Republican party into a minor party, especially if Clinton wins by a landslide. The only reason why they have any power at all today is because Democrats and Progressives went to sleep in 2010, letting Republicans take control of state legislatures in a census year and thus gerrymander a congressional map that lets Republicans maintain a substantial majority of House seats despite the American people voting overwhelmingly for Democrat candidates. What could fill the vacuum of power left behind by the collapse of the Republican Party?

In short, the fall of Republican Party is an opportunity for progressives and independents to remake the American electoral landscape to better reflect the will of the American people and a vote for Jill Stein will do nothing to advance that cause.

How We Got to Trump

There are a lot of potential lessons from the rise of Donald Trump as the Republican nominee for president and, given how the Republican establishment is falling in line to support someone they very recently told us was unfit for the job, it looks like many of those lessons will go unlearned. Perhaps the most important of the lessons, at least in terms of potentially improving our political discourse in the future, is how a Trump candidacy can even fucking happen. As much as Republicans, Trump voters, and some currents of the media would like us to believe that Trump is sui generis or a fluke or the result of an historically weak Republican field, he is the result of a long political process, one that has consequences far beyond the human parody now leading the Republican party. Understanding that process is the first step, both in preventing a Trump presidency and in recreating a political system in which future Trumps are impossible.

McCarthyism & the Red Scare

I don't think the idea of “real Americans” was born during McCarthyism and the House Committee on Unamerican Activities, (I'm sure there is a brilliant doctoral thesis out there about the idea of “real Americans” and how that idea has moved and changed and manipulated political discourse in our country.) but it was during the Red Scare that the traits of the “real American” began to include being a Christian living in a small town (rather than one of those out-of-touch big cities), who believed in capitalism (rather than in socialism or any of its possible forms). Furthermore, this is when actors, writers, and university professors were all summarily barred from the “Real American Club.” Given how it has defined populism, America has always had a fraught relationship with its public intellectuals, but it was here with McCarthy that the very act of intellectual exploration, or the development of intellectual talents, awareness, or resources, became inherently suspect. Essentially, this was the beginning of the end of nuanced, intellectual, and truth-seeking discourse in the public mainstream media.

The Southern Strategy

In the city of codes, the dude who just fucking says it, rules. I feel like there should be some bodily punishment for every Republican who refers to their party as “the party of Lincoln.” With the Southern strategy, Nixon and his allies sought to capture the racist southern Democrats who were alienated by the Civil Rights movement, by, well, by turning the Republican party into the party of racists. But, of course, no one said that. Instead, over time they developed a whole system of codes and policies (e.g. The War on Drugs) that disproportionately affected African Americans and other minorities; a system of codes that is easily transferable to whatever non-white group Republicans in power can blame for America's problems. All Donald Trump did with his racist nonsense was stop talking in the Republican code.

Morning in America

The American century from 1870-1970 saw the greatest increase in overall standards of living in human history. A combination of technological advancement and federal economic management essentially created the middle class, the single-income family, and retirement from the wreckage of the Great Depression and World War II. Really, the only white people who weren't substantially better off in 1970, than they had been in previous decades, were the rich oligarch assholes at the head of so much of society's previous misery. (Of course, they also benefited from the technological advances so it's really, really hard to argue they lost anything anyway.) Obviously, they weren't going to take their slight diminishment of power sitting down. And so, though the stagflation and general malaise of the 1970s were really just a blip at the end of unprecedented century and nothing that couldn't be fixed by some energy independence, rich assholes used it as an opportunity to dismantle the wealthiest and most equitable (for white people) economic system the world had ever seen.

Politics has always been an emotional game, but I believe it was here, with Regan's “Morning in America,” where a candidate ran on the idea that everything would be fixed if we just had the right person as president. Trump's success right now is almost entirely based on the idea that he'll just fix things because he's a good leader and we have Regan to thank for that. (Oh, and pretty much all of our current economic problems, but this piece isn't about those.)

Bill Clinton's Triangulation

It's one of those ideas that makes perfect sense: if you listen to both sides of an argument and take a position roughly in the middle, you'll get a lot of people to agree with you. Shit, you might even stumble into a good idea or compromise while you're at it. And by “makes perfect sense” I mean, “reveals politics as a shell game of shifting power structures that has nothing to do with fighting for the best policies.” In some ways, after losing so much political ground to Regan Republicans, Bill Clinton's triangulation wasn't a bad idea for winning back the White House and stemming the tide of conservative legislation. Unfortunately, rather than triangulating with him after his re-election, Republicans simply moved the center rightward. In the short term that meant Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the Defense of Marriage Act, Welfare Reform, the continuation of the drug war, the further dismantling of financial and consumer regulations that were such an important part of past growth, and, lest we forget, the George W. Bush presidency.

In the long term, this lead to an overall shift in policy towards the right (despite a population that is actually fairly liberal when their opinions are broken down issue by issue), while hamstringing the more liberal members of the Democratic party who suddenly found themselves radicalized simply for saying the same things Democrats have been saying since FDR.

The Myth of the Liberal Media

There was never a time of unbiased media. Though most did their best, journalists are human beings and their own biases and opinions are naturally going to color their reporting in some way. That said, there was a time when, despite the problem of bias, journalists at least tried to present objective truth to the public. Now, thanks to conservatives who kept ending up on the wrong side of the truth and Fox News, journalism consists of stating a few unassailable facts and presenting two opposing opinions about it, as if those opinions carry the same weight, whether rigorous critical analysis and research would reveal those opinions to have equal weight or not.

So many people, through little fault of their own, end up believing that utter bullshit is true, or, at least has enough truth in it to confirm their bias. Furthermore, we've now reached a point where the mainstream televised media doesn't seem to know how to critically explore an idea, topic, or policy, in a way that moves towards the truth. (It should terrify us, that comedians like John Oliver and Samantha Bee, seem to be the only one's who have figured out how to do in-depth reporting about a topic.) To put this another way, because we are no longer allowed to present a liberal truth without a side of conservative bullshit, mainstream media (which includes Fox, of course) is no longer capable of revealing Trump's bullshit.

McCain Picks Palin

As destructive to our democracy and our political process as all that other shit was, we still might not have Trump if it weren't for Sarah Palin. By selecting her as his running mate, John McCain legitimized a fringe-faction of the Republican party, while also legitimizing the anti-intellectual, totally myopic image of the “real American just speaking her mind.” In a way, Sarah Palin completely changed how we discuss the idea of being “qualified to be President.” Palin was so far beyond the idea of being qualified to be President that she very nearly undercut the debate about qualifications entirely. And, of course, without Palin there is likely no Tea Party.

The Tea Party Lies It's Face Off and Wins

Not a single thing the Tea Party “revolution” was based on had any shred of truth to it. We need to remember that. Not one fucking thing. We have the Tea Party because for one mid-term election, American voters bought a ton of bullshit about death panels, birth certificates, and the tyranny of getting health insurance. It wasn't just that a section of the population got particularly angry about a policy they didn't understand and then voted for a bunch of like-minded individuals; it's that Tea Party leaders and the Republicans who enabled them lied to the American people and the media let them. Since then, the Tea Party has become entrenched in Republican politics and shifted the Republican party far more to the right than maybe it has ever been, to the point where it is actively and unapologetically undermining the functioning of government.

Of course, government is still functioning and Barack Obama is still doing things, which, to those who believe in the Tea Party, means the Republican establishment is failing them. Hence, the destruction of John Boener's career. It's only natural then, that of the field of choices, Republican primary voters would choose the one posturing as the most extreme anti-establishment candidate.

How We Got to Trump

So how did we get to Trump? In short, white supremacism as a political force never went away it just hid itself in codes and we have removed critical discourse from our political process that reveals the racism and nationalism in those codes. I know there is a temptation to blame both sides for a political problem and though Democrats and especially Bill Clinton were involved in laying the ground work for Trump, the responsibility for his candidacy is not equally split. In short, Republican and conservative ideology is wrong, has been wrong for decades, and looks like it's going to be wrong until it finally dies. Sure, there are Republicans who offered substantive input into our political process and, sure, the Republican aversion to taxation and regulation can create important debates about the role of government and the efficacy of federal involvement in the economy and society, but, as a political ideology, social-conservatism and supply-side neoliberal economics are factually bad for the citizens of the United States of American and, well, human beings in general.

In order to keep getting elected despite being wrong, Republicans had to cater to racists, create wedge issues and litmus tests, wave the bloody American flag of shouted patriotism in a time of endless war, leverage the worst traits of organized religion, and become the lapdogs of the wealthy while preventing the rest of the country from learning just how much of their bullshit is bullshit. Given that Trump has four bankruptcies, a litany of failed businesses, is currently under investigation for fraud, would have as much or more money if just didn't mess around with what he inherited and still gets away with telling us he is a successful business, his nomination really isn't a surprise. Trump and the modern Republican party are a perfect fit.

Why Moderate Republicans Are 2016's Most Important Voters

Though it certainly can happen here (especially if Hilary Clinton is the Democratic nominee and she runs her general election campaign as if she is entitled to the presidency, which I don't think she is going to do) I don't think Donald Trump can win a general election. Right now, even as the front-runner, he is not winning over the majority of Republican primary voters and given his national unfavorability rating, his lack of support from the Republican establishment, and the fact that he's a fascist, I think there is a good chance he is already close to his ceiling for support. Furthermore, the relationship between the electoral college and America's shifting demographics stacks the deck for whoever the Democrat is anyway. This doesn't mean a Trump presidency is impossible (hold on, let me swallow that vomit back down), but I think it is still relatively unlikely.

But it is not enough for Trump to lose. Trump losing to Clinton (or Sanders) 47% to 53%, as Mitt Romney did to Barack Obama, means that Trump is a legitimate candidate. A 53/47 tells us that Donald Trump was the legitimate representative of the Republican party. A 53/47 loss tells the world that the United States is capable of making Donald Trump the most powerful person in the world. A 53/47 loss means we'll go through this all again in four years, whether in the form of second tries by Trump himself, Cruz, or Rubio, or Chuck Norris, or some radical demagogue who hasn't become a celebrity yet, and all of them will emulate the radical, hateful, fascistic techniques that got Trump so close to the presidency.

It is not enough for Trump to be defeated in November. The unprecedented candidate must suffer an unprecedented defeat. It must be 60/40 at least, but 65/35 would be acceptable and 70/30 better. Only then can we prevent this year's catastrophic carnival from happening again in four years, and only then can we prove to the world that we actually can be trusted with the power we have.

And that kind of landslide requires moderate Republicans voting for the Democrat. There is a lot that Democrats can do to inch those numbers up. An effective ground game, a compelling campaign, the fear of a Trump presidency, along with unusually high turnout from largely Democratic demographics could get us to 55/45 or maybe even 58/42 if all of those new voting restrictions don't mess things up too much. But even that's not enough.

To prevent another Trump, there needs to be a significant Republican defection. We need to show ourselves and the world that we can get beyond the little letters next to a candidate when we need to prevent the election of a fascist. And that responsibility falls to moderate Republicans.

Of course, Trump is not sui generis. His candidacy is the natural, even logical, endpoint to a decades long process that could be traced at least back to McCarthy's Red Scare, through the Republican Southern Strategy, Bill Clinton's triangulation, and the Tea Party of 2010.

It is important to remember how the Tea Party came to power. They were elected in 2010 on a platform built almost entirely on misunderstandings, misrepresentations, lies, and fear. They told us Obamacare would destroy the economy, cost American jobs, rob us of our medical freedom and, I don't know, make it illegal to enjoy a big old ice cream cone on a hot July day, and absolutely none of that is true. Furthermore, they ran on the promise of repealing Obamacare and not only did they utterly fail to do that, they made absolutely no progress developing a legislative structure for the repeal, building a viable alternative, or proposing reforms with a chance in hell of being passed. In the process, they shut down the government, played chicken with America's credit rating, ended the political career of John Boehner, and, in general, ground legislative progress to a halt. Donald Trump is just the Tea Party with a few extra filters off.

So, not only is it important for moderate Republicans to vote for the Democrat in the presidential election, if they want to have a legitimate political party for the foreseeable future, they will need to kick out the Freedom Caucus legislators, who both, set the stage for Donald Trump and have been abject legislative failures, both in terms of policy and procedure (I think at least) and in terms of their own campaign promises. And with the radically gerrymandered districts (more on that later) the only way that will happen is if moderate Republicans who are currently represented by Freedom Caucus legislators vote Democrat.

And then there's that whole thing about radical gerrymandering. The same collective freak out over Obamacare that drove the Tea Party into federal government, drove the Tea Party into state governments. The result has been radical gerrymandering (49.15% of Americans voted for a Democrat in the house, compared to 48.03% who voted for Republicans in 2014, so that 33 seat Republican majority is....democracy?), a coordinated attack on voting rights targeting largely Democratic demographics, the spiteful rejection of Medicare expansion, and an obsessive war on reproductive rights, all while generally wrecking their states' budgets (school systems, water supplies...) through reckless tax cuts. Dwight D. Eisenhower would not improve. (Hell, Richard Nixon might not even approve.)

If moderate Republicans are truly serious about taking their party back from the radical fringe, all they have to do is lose big in 2016. They can then rebuild the party from there.

I know there is still a good chance Trump will not be the nominee, but honestly, this principle holds for any of the other current options. Ted Cruz believes he is on a mission from God, Marco Rubio has proven himself to be utterly incapable of functioning in high pressure situations, Paul Ryan's policies live in a Randian fantasy world, and somehow John Kasich might be even worse, especially on women's issues. Given what the Republican party has become, how they have let racism, cheap power grabs, and radical strains of Christianity infect their party, the only responsible thing for moderate Republicans to do in November is hold their nose and vote for the Democrat.

There is a lot that Democrats and liberals can do to beat Trump, but, ultimately (unless there is truly miraculous voter turnout), that just treats the symptom, not the cause. The power to truly stop Trump, not just the person, but the political concept, rests in the hands of moderate Republicans.